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Former Tigers win Sri Lanka poll

Batticaloa holds first election in 14 years as bombing kills one person in Colombo.

11 Mar 2008 19:19 GMT

Sri Lankans in Batticaloa are electing municipal and local officials for the first time in 14 years [AFP]

They then helped government forces to drive the Tamil Tigers out of the eastern Province last year, paving the way for Monday's elections.

Violence and intimidation

As polls opened, one person was killed and several others wounded in a bomb blast in a predominantly Tamil residential area in the capital, Colombo.

Thousands of troops and police stood guard at razor wire checkpoints and patrolled in armoured vehicles to prevent attacks.

The former members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were expected to win the elections which are being seen as a test of a plan for greater devolution in minority Tamil areas.

Batticaloa election

Batticaloa is a Tamil majority area.

One municipal council and eight local government bodies will be elected.

6,500 security personnel deployed during polling.

UNP, the main opposition, and Tiger-backed TNA have boycotted

the election.

The district was under Tamil Tiger control for 13 years.

Government troops recaptured the area last July.

However, human rights groups believe the elections are unlikely to be free and fair because of violence and intimidation.

They have also questioned the government's decision to endorse the TMVP, even though it is now working with the government in Batticaloa.

They have been accused of widespread abuses, including recruiting child soldiers, abductions and killings.

Karuna himself left Sri Lanka in 2007 and is now in the UK.

Edwin Krishnanandaraja, also known as Pradeep Master, a political leader of the newly registered party in Batticaloa, is a former Tamil Tiger who joined the rebels as a child soldier.

He is tipped to be Batticaloa's next mayor, and rejects the accusations of abuses by his group.

"They are baseless," Krishnanandaraja said. "Our members were being killed. Because of that, we used weapons. When our political right is confirmed, we will hand them over."

Disarming fighters

Rajapaksa has refused to disarm the TMVP, arguing that it could not find weapons on its members.

Rights groups have also accused the state of complicity in the abuses and also believe polls have come too soon.

"In Batticaloa, not only TMVP, many other armed groups are also there," Kingsley Rodrigo, chairman of the People's Alliance for Free and Fair Elections, the island's main election monitoring body, said.

Sinnakutty Nagalingam, a father of three who works as a mason, said: "We don't expect the leaders to give us anything other than a chance to live in peace. If there is peace, we can work and take care of ourselves.

"With this situation, if we go out to work, there is no certainty that we will return home."

Colombo blast

Hospital authorities say that one person was killed and several wounded, including four school children, in the bomb blast in Colombo's Wellawatta neighbourhood.

The bomb was hidden in a flowerbed on the main Galle highway, Udaya Nanayakkara, a military spokesman, said.

Officials say the attack bears all the hallmarks of the LTTE, but there was no immediate claim of responsibility from the group.

The government has become increasingly isolated in the international community after it formally scrapped a six year truce.

Since then it has launched an offensive against the Tamil Tiger group, which is seeking an autonomous Tamil nation, and has said it plans to defeat the group by the end of the year.